Wow. We just had a comment on this blog, which hasn't been used for 4 years. Indeed, I was surprised to find it still existed! If you'd like to follow us to where we are now, then we switched to using Facebook a while back - click here to make the leap... Good bye G & L

Salad Days

One of my greatest surprises is the beauty to be found in polytunnels!

Infamous infrequency

Even for our infamously infrequent blog, I know that we've been remarkably inactive!

A number of things have contributed to this...

1) Sloth - hey it's winter, we're nearly hibernating!

2) We're not actually hibernating at all. In fact we're very busy, but European cross-border legal directives (Lindsay) and LP Gas association annual reports (Guy) are not really what this blog is about.

and lastly... 3) Techno-hassle (to quote Neil from The Young Ones - yes, we are that old, and no, it wasn't in black and white). I've been trying to set up automated publishing to our new Facebook page and to date have had little success. I think I may have just cracked it, though - with a FB application called NetworkedBlogs, for those who might be interested.

So hopefully this will auto-publish into Facebook and I can get blogging again. I do actually have a few things I want to post.

But don't hold your breath - see points 1 and 2, above.

Stalled Movie Distribution Career

I've just been trying to upload a slideshow movie that I've made of the Mas des Grand'Terres highlights, but it keeps crashing halfway through uploading. So, instead, here are a few of the stills used to compile the movie, showing a few of this summer's new features...

I've been framing some of my best photographs of Provence and hanging them in the gîtes.

The tractor shed upgrade is now complete, with floaty curtains, rehung tractor portraits, new lighting and a new floor, plus rustic wooden wall cladding.

See.  I haven't had my feet up all summer!

Doh!

Storms and Shocks

We had our first summer storm a few days ago and after an hour of heavy ran, the sun came out and steam began to rise from the garden.  This reminded me of some pictures that I'd taken a year or so ago and I went back to look at them again.  Here they are...

I was (pleasantly) shocked to see how much change has happened in the garden since I took this shot back in June 2008.  Here's the same scene now...
Obviously, the grass is looking a little less lush, as it's the end of August and it hasn't been rained on since May (excepting the storm).  But haven't the pampas grasses grown?  Not to mention the cherry tree halfway down on the right.  And it's hard to imagine that we've only had our pergolas for just over a year.  You can see the posts were in in June ’08.  Now the spiky garden is already looking very established around the pergola with the siesta bed in it...

Olive Grove

This olive grove lies at the foot of the cliffs upon the top of which the 'village perché' (perched village) of Les-Baux-de-Provence sits. This photograph was taken from the ramparts of the medieval castle as the sun sank lower in the late afternoon.

Picasso Underground

I've written about the Cathedrale d'Image at Les Baux before... a rolling sound and light show in the disused bauxite quarries hollowed out of the centre of the Alpilles hills.

This year's theme is Picasso.  Rather than present his work chronologically, it explores various themes that ran throughout his life - his women, war, bulls and minotaurs, and so on. 

It's impossible to geta a clear impression of what the show is like with a hand held, still camera.  (These are just a stab in the dark - literally.)  Images cross-fade and juxtapose all around you, immersing you in them.  That combined with the rough hewn nature of the quarry walls, makes this an ideal way to explore the work of the master cubist.
It's 45 minutes, offers an extremely cool respite from the fierce Provençal heat and we urge every one of of our visitors to experience this unique and inspiring spectacle.